Interesting article. George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney, and John McCain all skipped out on this years GOP convention.

A needless worry IMO. GWB should have worried more about what he was doing to the country while he was President. From what I’ve read, he wasn’t too “Republican-like” himself with regard to spending, let alone the invasion of Iraq.

A needless worry IMO. GWB should have worried more about what he was doing to the country while he was President. From what I’ve read, he wasn’t too “Republican-like” himself with regard to spending, let alone the invasion of Iraq.

True. Really, all presidents should be focusing on what’s going on! That’s the job of a president, and hopefully, that’s how it will always be.

A needless worry IMO. GWB should have worried more about what he was doing to the country while he was President. From what I’ve read, he wasn’t too “Republican-like” himself with regard to spending, let alone the invasion of Iraq.

I think Republicans in general don’t have that good of a track record when it comes to spending. They talk a good game about the need for fiscal responsibility, but they are rarely fiscally responsible.

Compassionate conservatism is what Bush ran on. and that was rejected with the rise of the Tea party.
In terms of social spending nevertheless, compassionate conservatism would in no way imply fiscal conservatism, so the fact that Donald Trump is also a liberal on social spending could not be what George W Bush is expressing concern over.

The Tea party itself has never carried a candidate to the presidency. or even through the nomination process for candidacy for presidential office. The fiscal conservatism of the Tea party movement was able to carry Republicans to congressional majorities, but not to the WH. GWB was simply not of the Tea party movement, and neither is Donald Trump.

Of course, the large deficits of the Bush years were on account of the fact that the presidency of GWB turned out to be a war presidency. Americans understood this well enough when they signed on for his second term.
That spending is on the American people themselves therefore, and to their credit too. Altruistic sacrifice of blood and money in an attempt to make the lives of others better is what makes America an exceptional nation. Conservative Americans will not put balanced check books in front of altruism, and that is something that conservatives outside of America will never hold against neither GWB nor Americans in general.

Instead, George W Bush was a Texas politician who very well understood the importance of appealing to an electorate outside of the grievances of the white working class. His electoral success in Texas was build on appealing to the Hispanic demographic as well, and ensuring them that they had a place in a Republican government…

That is the issue that is impelling George W Bush to come back into the light, and to issue the kind of statement that he is right now. Thais is the issue upon which GWB, and a large swath of the GOP is diametrically opposed to Donald Trump on.

I am sure that GWB has few regrets about how he ran his presidency.He was a true Christian acting upon his conscience and according to the best information he had. Any personal criticism that either Trump or anybody has against him, he is more than able to let roll off his back. He understands well enough that 911 was not an inside job, and there is no point in arguing against fools and the inane points that they make.

But alienating a huge swath of the American population, like Donald Trump has by appealing to the thin skins of Americans with grievances, has never been what George W Bush is about. It strikes at the heart of what he understood the GOP to be.

And the bottom line here, he does not see this as a winning ticket. …
Does anybody?

The long term implications of this, even if by some extraordinary set of events Donald Trump does pull it off and the corrupt and incompetent HRC is rejected, are hard for many Republicans - “Compassionate” or fiscally conservative- to stomach.

Of course, the large deficits of the Bush years were on account of the fact that the presidency of GWB turned out to be a war presidency. Americans understood this well enough when they signed on for his second term.
That spending is on the American people themselves therefore, and to their credit too. Altruistic sacrifice of blood and money in an attempt to make the lives of others better is what makes America an exceptional nation. Conservative Americans will not put balanced check books in front of altruism, and that is something that conservatives outside of America will never hold against neither GWB nor Americans in general.

George Bush took us to war and made our grandchildren pay for it. There is nothing redeeming nor charitable in that. The worst part about it was that there was no reason for the current generation not to pay for the war. We could have easily raised taxes to pay for it. Then those who supported the war could have put their money where their mouths are. But to go to war and stick someone else with the bill is immoral. I have yet to hear a coherent reason why the future generation ought to pay for the war, talk about taxation without representation!

Time will tell. There are pro-life Democrats and socially conservative Democrats, too, but those are few in number.

However, remember Romans 13:1. We must obey the governing authorities and God placed them there.

No-one is arguing about that.

Personally, I am thoroughly disgusted with the entire wheel of governance and the drive to return to aristocracy, as represented by the male candidate in this campaign, but like a third of a billion others I will have to put up with it and count it toward my penance.

The GOP has become an afterthought anyway as major state after major state has become a Democratic lock, so maybe it’s best if they go “quietly into the night” and as in 1856, a new party banner rises.

I am concerned that George W. Bush might have been the last Republican President as well. Liberalism is very strong in America. Conservatism has been dealt some major blows since Bush left office. The powers that be want liberalism in America. It will be an upset if Trump wins this year. I have some hope that it will happen though.

Personally, I am thoroughly disgusted with the entire wheel of governance and the drive to return to aristocracy, as represented by the male candidate in this campaign, but like a third of a billion others I will have to put up with it and count it toward my penance.

The GOP has become an afterthought anyway as major state after major state has become a Democratic lock, so maybe it’s best if they go “quietly into the night” and as in 1856, a new party banner rises.

ICXC NIKA

One thing we can be sure of is that the Republican Party will NOT go ‘quietly into the night’ so long as Donald Trump, purported captain, is leading the charge.

I don’t see the demise of the Republican Party. Even if Trump wins or loses. For the party to fracture completely you need a really divisive set of issues; and I don’t see them.

The republican party does have a credibility problem. They claim to be for small government, but in reality they are a big government party. The ate the low hanging fruit of tax cuts to the point where tax cuts have little impact on the economy in the presence of deficits. On the other hand, there is a sizable fraction that would not vote for democrats no matter what, so they are not going away any time soon.

The republican party does have a credibility problem. They claim to be for small government, but in reality they are a big government party. The ate the low hanging fruit of tax cuts to the point where tax cuts have little impact on the economy in the presence of deficits. On the other hand, there is a sizable fraction that would not vote for democrats no matter what, so they are not going away any time soon.

The Republican Party (at least until Trump) has been for the last 65 years mostly the party of big business. Whatever helps big business, is what the party is for, and whatever hurts big business is what the party is against.

Compassionate conservatism is what Bush ran on. and that was rejected with the rise of the Tea party.

The Tea party itself has never carried a candidate to the presidency. or even through the nomination process for candidacy for presidential office. The fiscal conservatism of the Tea party movement was able to carry Republicans to congressional majorities, but not to the WH. GWB was simply not of the Tea party movement, and neither is Donald Trump.

Actually the Tea Party may have played a role in carrying Donald Trump to the nomination.

“To some, his rise is clearly the Tea Party’s fault. The right-wingers, this argument goes, weakened and divided the party, stoking people’s rage against Washington and government. With racial undertones, their rallying cries preyed on fear and hatred. Figures like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh spent years telling the conservative base that Republican officeholders were selling them out at every turn, and that the only solution was to toss out anyone who’d been in office for more than five minutes—to elect new representatives whose answer to everything, even funding the normal operations of government, would be: “Hell, no.” They encouraged the base’s paranoia and conspiracy theories; its distrust of institutions, including political parties and the media; and its irrational hatred of anything associated with Barack Obama.”

“Was it any wonder, then, that a candidate came along whose anger was even more consuming and less constructive, whose disregard for political norms was even more flamboyant, whose appeals to racial resentment were even more overt, whose disregard for fact and fondness for conspiracy was even more pronounced? As the conservative writer Matt Lewis put it last week, “Ted Cruz helped create an environment where populist demagoguery would flourish on the right.” But Cruz was hoist by his own petard, Lewis wrote, when Tea Party figures like Sarah Palin and Ann Coulter found Trump’s brand of this tonic even more potent. Trump, in this view, was just Cruz on steroids.”

The Republican Party (at least until Trump) has been for the last 65 years mostly the party of big business. Whatever helps big business, is what the party is for, and whatever hurts big business is what the party is against.

Frankly, I don’t think the Dems are any different when it comes to this, and are imaginably even more so.